


Revolution Heaven

by Moraith



Category: Subarashiki Kono Sekai | The World Ends With You
Genre: Backstory, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Gen, M/M, Post-Canon, dubiously canon compliant
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-19
Updated: 2017-10-29
Packaged: 2019-01-19 11:28:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 9,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12409473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moraith/pseuds/Moraith
Summary: After having disappeared off to who knows where for five years, Joshua is back and just as much of a cagey obnoxious know-it-all as ever. Hanekoma is gone and his Angelic replacement has to not only deal with the most notoriously volatile Composer in the entire UG, she also has to run a café for humans for some reason.Meanwhile, Neku discovers that, even if it sounded cool and fun when you were fifteen and you've been nursing an ill-advised crush for literal years, having a god fall in love with you might actually suck a big one.Post-canon Neku-POV Joshua-centric worldbuilding-y shipping nonsense with also maybe some plot.





	1. Prelude

CAT stopped making art almost immediately after Neku came back to life. Rumors spread that he was dead, or had retired, or been arrested, or had taken on a new name and was still out there working somewhere overseas. None of them were ever substantiated or disproved. Before long, the whole thing was swept out of the public's collective mind by the next craze. Only the diehard fans remembered CAT's work a year later. The clothes he designed stopped being sold. The mural in Udagawa got painted over. Even his café, not that anyone besides Neku knew it was his, got shut down. All that was left of him were photographs of his old work in dusty back rooms and strange seldom-visited corners on the internet.

Neku visited the boarded-up café on Cat Street and the alley where the mural was supposed to be from time to time through the end of high school. There wasn't much going on at either one, but he held on to the hope that maybe one of these days someone was going to show up. No one ever did, of course, aside from the people who worked at the nearby stores and the occasional passerby who didn't have any time for an overdramatic emotional teenager.

Once he was away at college most of the time, he stopped visiting as often. It was only a little over an hour away from campus by train, but the mural and café were both gone, so it was hardly worth the trip just for the slim off-chance that maybe there would be a Reaper or something lurking nearby. When he was already in the area, spending time with friends or family, he would usually take a look, but there was never much to see.

That was, of course, until there was.

It was an unusually cold day in early April, just before the start of the school year. Neku, Shiki, Beat, and Rhyme met up at Hachiko to say goodbye to the vacation, as per tradition. They spent the day together wandering the streets, catching up and window shopping and watching the crowds go by. Neku saw everyone off at the end of the day, then tugged his scarf up over his nose and mouth to fight off the cold and watched them go.

It wasn't that late, but Shiki had work in the morning and had to take off early and Beat had work later that night and also had to leave. Rhyme went with Beat, leaving Neku on his own. He didn't have anything in particular to do, but it seemed like a shame to leave just like that and spend the end of his vacation at home alone. He slipped into the crowd and let his feet take him somewhere without thinking too hard about it.

Neku ran his thumb over the scratched-up surface of his Player Pin as he walked. He was the only one who still had his. Beat's and Rhyme's and Shiki's all disappeared at the end of the Game. One of Neku's did too, but the second one stuck around. When he first found it, he agonized for days over what it meant. He was sure it was a sign or a message. Everything else from the Game disappeared: the money, the clothes, the pins; all gone. Surely there was no way they could have just missed the one.

When nothing else happened, even years later, he had to concede that it was probably just because it was never officially assigned to him. The Reapers almost certainly didn't have a protocol for taking back random pins that got tossed at you while you were bleeding out on the ground. It never really meant anything at all; just like everything else _he_ did.

Neku kept it anyway. It meant something to him, even if it wasn't supposed to.

He ended up at Cat Street, since that was the routine. He walked past the Jupiter of the Monkey store, waving vaguely to the door in case the whoever was working there today recognized him, then headed for the former location of WildKat at the end of the street. The scent of freshly-brewed coffee hit him before he registered that the windows were no longer shuttered. He blinked owlishly at the sign over the door. He was apparently standing in front of the Canopy Café, but as far as he could tell, it wasn't any different than WildKat. It had the same menu (sparse) the same hours (infrequent) the same furniture (shabby) and the same weird unappealing atmosphere.

Neku tentatively pushed open the front door only to be greeted by an entirely unfamiliar young woman. He froze in place. He wasn't particularly expecting to see Mr. H behind the counter after the name change and the years of absence, but somehow it was still deeply odd to see someone else in his place. He raised his arm stiffly in an awkward approximation of a wave hello.

She was unremarkable in pretty much every way other than the fact that she was not Sanae Hanekoma. She was average height, average weight, and had no particularly distinctive facial features. She had her hair up in a loose bun and looked sort of tired, more in an existential way than due to lack of sleep. She was about what Neku would expect a barista in a back-alley café to look like. “Feel free to sit anywhere,” she said.

Neku took a seat at the counter—the same one he used to sit at before WildKat closed—and took off his scarf. “Sure. Uh... you're open, right? I'll have some coffee, I guess. The house blend.” The barista nodded and stepped into the kitchen. Neku looked around the shop with more careful scrutiny now that he was a paying customer. His memory was fuzzy, but as far as he could tell, the new owner hadn't moved even a single chair since Mr. H disappeared. It was surreal and unsettling and distantly comforting all at once in a way that made Neku vaguely sick to his stomach.

When the barista returned with Neku's coffee, he mumbled a quiet thank you and stared far too intently at the mug. He took a long careful sip, though it was still a bit too hot to drink comfortably and... yeah, like everything else, that was the same, too. He ran his tongue over the roof of his mouth with a pained wince, then cleared his throat. “Hey, um... you... wouldn't happen to know Sanae Hanekoma, would you?” he asked.

The barista shook her head. “Sorry. Friend of yours?”

“...Right.” Neku watched the steam rise out of the coffee cup and swirl in the air, then tentatively blew it away and took another sip, more slowly. He didn't burn himself again, quite, but the heat was uncomfortable on his tongue. “Not exactly a friend. He's the guy who used to own this place.” He smiled crookedly at the barista. “Don't worry about it... um... whatever your name is. I'm Neku Sakuraba. Nice to meet you.”

“Kozue Kiribayashi. Likewise.”

No one else came into the café, so Neku got to spend the entire time he was there talking to Kozue. She wasn't especially friendly or talkative, but he managed to find out some things. Apparently the café had only opened a few days before, which explained why Neku hadn't heard about it. Kozue had just moved to Tokyo to get out of the countryside where her family lived and bought this place because it was cheap. The reason the place still looked like WildKat was, so she said, that she wasn't much of an interior decorator or an entrepreneur and she thought it would be a good idea to stick with what worked for the previous owner. Neku didn't point out that said previous owner's café went out of business years ago; it would probably be more rude than it was worth. 

Being there felt less and less strange as the longer he stayed. Kozue had very little in common with Mr. H, which was disappointing in a way, and very strange, but made it easier to deal with the otherwise eerie familiarity of the café.

He finished off his coffee, paid, said goodbye to Kozue, then headed out into the cold city streets again, disoriented and off-balance, but in good enough spirits. The next stop was Udagawa. After his success (such as it was) at the café, it was difficult not to be hopeful for something in the alley, too.

The last time he visited the back alley where CAT's mural used to be was almost a year ago. Back then, the sloppily-applied coats of grey over the mural were chipping off in places, revealing the bright colors underneath. Neku's hands itched when he saw it. He wanted so badly to claw away the grey until his fingers were raw and bleeding and the colors underneath were finally free again. Instead, he put his headphones on, walked away, and tried not to feel the prickling under his skin and the burning pressure behind his eyes.

That same grief and tension fought for dominance with his cautious optimism as he made his way through the narrow streets for the first time in a year. Anxious fluttery anticipation prickled under Neku's skin as he rounded the last corner and entered the alley.

This time, wall at the end was neither blank nor grey. The colors—blues and greens and browns; almost naturalistic but not quite; something was not quite right but it _felt_ right, or so close that it didn't matter, anyway (or did it?)—seemed to jump off the wall and directly into Neku's head. It was a landscape, maybe, or maybe it was just abstract. There were recognizable elements—trees, cliffs, waterfalls, land masses and sky—but none of it quite lined up in a way that made sense. It didn't look artificial at all; it was more like looking into a natural world where all the rules are just slightly different. It was bewildering and disorienting and breathtaking. His eyes couldn't settle anywhere until he had taken in every single line and shape and color the wall had to offer. He barely even noticed it when the artist, still finishing off the last details in the bottom right corner, stood up and turned around.

A soft chuckle, as familiar as the new mural was unfamiliar, cut through the heavy awestruck silence. “Like a moth to a flame. You're awfully eager to get burned again, aren't you, Neku?” The familiar figure—smirking, because of course he was—put a hand on his hip, then lazily raised his other arm, pointing his hand at Neku in the shape of a gun. “Bang.”

Neku flinched. He stumbled back, his heart pounding and his chest tight. After a few desperate terrified moments, Neku noted the distinct lack of pain and blood. He shuddered out a breath and dragged a hand over his face. “Ha ha. Very funny,” he said.

Neku shoved his trembling hand back into his pocket and rolled his shoulders to hide the tension settling into them. On the one hand, he was _right_. Neku couldn't help but be smugly satisfied that he had finally gotten everything he wanted after the countless disappointments. On the other hand, Kozue's knockoff café and this new knockoff mural weren't exactly what he was hoping for. That, and one other significant problem. “Joshua, you're...” There were so many things Neku could have said then: _'evil;' 'an asshole;' 'here;' 'an amazing artist.'_ The one that came to the front of Neku's mind, and more importantly out of his mouth, was “...fifteen.”

Joshua lowered his arm and arched his eyebrows at Neku, looking haughty and unimpressed in the same way he always used to. It was as if no time had passed for Joshua at all since the last time they met. “Am I?” he asked.

Neku ran his tongue over his teeth and eyed Joshua up. He looked exactly the same as he did back when they were partners in the Reapers' Game, from his way-too-expensive trendy clothes to his obnoxious air of superiority to his pale skin and his ever-so-slightly curly hair. “...Yeah?” Neku ventured.

“If you say so, Neku,” Joshua said, his tone probably going for agreeable and landing firmly in indulgent condescension. Joshua turned back around and knelt in front of the wall. He picked up a paintbrush—and now that Neku was really looking, there was a tarp on the ground and brushes and rollers and paint and tape and everything else you could possibly need for an operation like this right there. It was sort of funny to imagine Joshua stooping to using ordinary human painting equipment. If you had asked him, Neku would have assumed Joshua would just magic art into existence with a snap of his fingers or something equally arcane and mystical and otherworldly. Apparently not. Joshua went back to doing the last of his detail work with diligent care and attention. “So, did you want something?”

There were a thousand questions burning in the back of Neku's mind, just out of reach. Back when he was fresh from the Reapers' Game, he wanted more than anything to find Joshua and scream at him until his throat burned and his voice was gone and he finally (maybe) understood. He hadn't touched those feelings in so long that they had gotten knotted up and tangled and more incomprehensible than ever, forgotten, or almost forgotten, somewhere deep inside him. He thought this was going to go the same way meeting Kozue had: awkward and melancholy and sort of uncomfortable, but not that complicated. He thought he was over this. He wasn't. Now that the shock—the sheer blunt stupidity of Joshua actually _being here—_ had faded, Neku felt like he was drowning.

He struggled to force himself to say something—anything—before Joshua took his silence as a 'no' and disappeared again for another five years. He stumbled over half-formed 'why's and 'how's and 'where were you's and 'how could you's until tears were welling in his eyes and he had to slap a hand over his mouth to keep the sobs from spilling over. “I've been looking for you for years,” he whispered eventually, confusion and desperation straining the words to the point that even Neku could barely understand them past his scarf and his hand covering his mouth.

“And you found me. Congratulations.” Joshua set his paintbrush down, then pulled his cell phone out of his pocket and flipped it open. “You probably should have decided what to say somewhere in there. At this rate, you're going to run out of time.”

Neku laughed mirthlessly, more of a sob than anything. “God, you're... still like this, huh?” he croaked. He sniffled and wiped at his eyes with the heels of his palms. It did nothing to stop the tears and his face must have looked awful but maybe it was the thought that counted. He needed to come up with something real to ask. Even with his head spinning, there was one obvious question. The café and the mural, both gone, replaced by something new. “What happened to Mr. H?” he asked, his voice weak and barely audible.

Joshua rolled his eyes at his phone, then flipped it closed and put it back in his pocket. He stood up and took a few steps backward away from the wall, then surveyed his own work with a distantly appraising expression. “Neku, thoughts?” he asked, with a loose gesture toward the wall.

Neku shuddered out a sigh, wiped at his face more properly with his sleeves, and took another long look at the mural. If there was one thing he remembered about Joshua (there were a lot more than one, but that was beside the point) it was that you could never get anything out of him unless you went along with whatever stupid bullshit he was stuck on first. Maybe it was important, or had something to do with where Hanekoma went. Or maybe Joshua was fishing for compliments. Either way, Neku didn't have much choice in the matter.

“...It's beautiful,” he began, because it was true. His voice was still weak and thick with tears, despite his best efforts. He cleared his throat and tried again with more strength. “And different. CAT's mural was more like...” Neku furrowed his brow as he fished for the words to describe it. It was too big and too important to talk about. No matter what he came up with, it felt wrong. “...it was like you were a part of it. What it you got out of it was what made it great. Yours is more...” He glanced at Joshua, then looked back at the mural. “...it's only about itself. It's drawing you in. It's screaming for someone to notice it and it's hard to look away, but it's... it's like it's swallowing you whole. Something like that.”

Joshua hummed thoughtfully, either oblivious or indifferent to Neku's crisis. “Not really what I was going for, but I'll take it. I must be rusty.” He put his hands on his hips, then turned toward Neku, smirking. “By the way, the hair doesn't suit you. You should go back to dyeing it.”

Neku attempted a sardonic snort. He ended up coughing and tearing up again. “Yeah. I bet you'd love it if I started dying again,” he said.

“Sounds to me like you're halfway there already.”

“I'm just _crying_ , you _dick_.”

Joshua shrugged theatrically and started to say something else when his phone buzzed. He interrupted himself to check his messages, then abruptly started walking off toward Shibuya proper. “That's my cue. Let's catch up over coffee one of these days,” he said, not even bothering to look over his shoulder.

Neku stumbled after Joshua for a few steps, reaching out toward him on instinct. “Wait! Don't go! Can I least have your—” And he was gone. Joshua disappeared into thin air without any fanfare. Neku deflated and let his arm drop to his side. “...phone number,” he finished weakly.

There was no response. No last-minute gotcha or mysterious text message from an unknown number. Just Neku standing alone in an empty alley with tears in his eyes and a lump in his throat and nothing to show for it.

As soon as Joshua was gone, everything he probably should have said rushed back to him at once. He didn't give Rhyme her dreams back, even after everything. If he wasn't going to blow everything up, why did he make such a big deal out of it? What was the point of disguising himself as a Player if it didn't matter what happened to him during the Game? Shiki and Beat and Rhyme didn't show up unconscious in the middle of the Scramble when they came back, so that was _definitely_ a prank. Why, out of everyone in the city, did he choose Neku? Where did he go for all those years? Seriously, what happened to CAT?

But there was no one to direct any of that to. Instead, Neku turned back toward the mural (and oddly enough, the tarp and everything on it had disappeared at some point; probably Reaper magic and probably best not to dwell on it) and took a few photos of it with his phone. He posted them to Twitter and sent them to the few people he knew at school who were into street art, then spent the whole walk home deflecting people ragging on his sloppy photography and trying not to think too hard about anything that happened to him today.

He got home too early for his parents to be home from work, so he reluctantly got started on making dinner on his own. His own thoughts raced too quickly for him to follow them. There were too many details that might or might not have been important and Neku kept getting stuck on _why the hell would you wear a shirt that nice while you're painting?_ It was nice to have something to distract him from that mess for a while, even if the food suffered for it.

He spent the whole night out of it and brooding and agonizing and feeling very much like he was fifteen years old again, which is not a feeling anyone should ever have. He ate his dinner as best as he could when he was obsessing and he could swear everything he put in his mouth tasted like WildKat coffee. He told his parents about the café and the mural when they got home. He did not tell them about Joshua. He typed out and didn't send about a dozen different messages to Shiki, then to Beat, before giving up and going to bed. He hoped, dimly, that all of this would somehow work itself out on its own overnight or turn out to be a weird back to school stress dream.

It didn't.


	2. It's still weird to hit on high schoolers, even if you're 400 years old.

Neku woke up dizzy and disoriented but thoroughly awake at dawn. He wasn't normally an early riser, but he always had trouble sleeping when he had something on his mind. He glared feebly at the rising sun outside his window while he fumbled for his cell phone to check the time. Not quite 5:30 AM. Not quite 5:30 AM was a time no human being should ever have to see.

Neku's Twitter account was blowing up (as much as it was ever blowing up) over the new mural in Udagawa. He scrolled idly through his notifications while he dragged himself out of bed and wandered to the bathroom to brush his teeth. Apparently someone had gotten better pictures of it at some point in the wee hours, though the best ones taken in real daylight were obviously yet to come. People had mostly moved on to speculating about the artist; whether it was CAT making a comeback or an as-of-yet unheard from protégé or someone entirely unrelated. Neku didn't bother responding to any of it.

He checked on his parents (yup; still asleep), then headed to the kitchen to get some caffeine in his body so he wasn't in danger of passing out in the middle of moving into his dorm room later. He paused with his hand on the cabinet's handle. _Let's catch up over coffee_. Neku's eyes drifted toward the door. It was meaningless. There were a hundred different places in Shibuya Neku could get coffee at and he had no idea which one Joshua would be at. For that matter, Joshua probably wasn't even awake at this ungodly hour. It's not like it was a real offer; he had no way to contact Joshua and no idea where he could possibly be. The only place he could even think to look hadn't been there for years.

Neku blinked, suddenly feeling marginally more awake. Of course. That's how it always was. Joshua was always just cryptic enough to make you tie yourself in knots over what he meant, but it was always, always, the most obvious thing. “Don't know Sanae Hanekoma, my ass...” he muttered under his breath.

Neku grabbed a coat and headed toward Cat Street. His breath formed thin white clouds as he walked through the chilly spring air. His legs were stiff and achy, but at least being outside was waking him up. The streets weren't quite empty, even at this hour. Neku wove his way past serious-looking men in business suits on their way to the station and people out jogging or walking their dogs and other artsy weirdos doing their own thing in the remains of the twilight.

The Canopy Café was open, just as expected. Neku stepped through the door without hesitation and was immediately greeted, not by Kozue's detached businesslike welcome, but by a familiar high nasally voice saying, “For the record, this has nothing to do with me. He found you first.”

Joshua was right there in all his glory, lounging in one of the booths leafing through a fashion magazine as if nothing at all were going on. Neku didn't even register Kozue's belated greeting. If one thing had worked itself out overnight, it was those initial weepy starstruck overwhelmed feelings. Today was a fresh start, and Neku wasn't planning to waste it. He had settled into the only thing anyone should be in a situation like this: royally fucking pissed at Joshua Kiryu.

He charged across the café and lunged at Joshua, grabbing a fistful of his shirt and hauling him upright. “ _Joshua_ ,” he snarled.

Joshua didn't fight; he rolled his eyes and batted idly at Neku's hand with his magazine, not anything like hard enough to make him let go, but hard enough to be noticeable and acutely annoying. “Violence isn't the answer, Neku,” he said sagely.

“Says the guy who shot me! _Twice!_ ” Neku growled, tightening his grip on Joshua's shirt.

Joshua sighed. “Ugh. Come on, Neku. I haven't shot you in years. I'm a changed man.”

Kozue cleared her throat pointedly, but did not say anything or move to intervene. She stayed put behind the counter, moving things on and off shelves with quiet shuffling noises that didn't belong at all in the middle of a brawl.

It wasn't much of an intervention, but it was enough to make Neku self-conscious enough to at least pretend he didn't want to slug Joshua in the face. He dropped Joshua unceremoniously and took a half-step back while Joshua straightened his shirt and settled in his seat again.

Neku hissed a breath through clenched teeth. “Uh-huh. Changed,” he muttered, seething too much for the sarcasm to quite come across properly. “You're like night and day, Josh.”

Joshua giggled and leaned around Neku to smirk at Kozue. “Neku thinks you're bad at your job, Kozue,” he said. “Maybe you should pick up the pace...?”

“Maybe _you_ should pick up the pace, Kiryu,” Kozue said dryly.

Neku looked between the two of them, irritation still prickling under his skin. It's more Reaper stuff, almost certainly, though Kozue could stand to pick up the pace in terms of owning a café while she was at it. Having to listen in to a conversation Joshua was having that's kind of about him that he half understood at best was old familiar territory and just as infuriating as ever. He debated whether to ask, then concluded that he didn't have the patience for more cryptic non-answers this early in the morning.

He slid into the seat opposite Joshua and propped his elbows up on the table. “...Rhyme lost her dreams,” he said. “And you shot me. And you almost blew up Shibuya. You lied to me and betrayed me and then you were gone and now you're back and you're acting like nothing ever happened.”

Joshua glanced up at Neku momentarily, then returned to leafing through his magazine. “That's about the size of it. Good to see your memory is still in tip-top shape in your old age.”

Neku gave Joshua a flat look. Talking to him was exhausting in a way Neku never appreciated when he was in a constant state of half-panicked fight-or-flight response. Getting an answer about why Joshua did anything would take all day for sure. Saying something about how Joshua was _definitely_ older than him and how for that matter _twenty_ obviously isn't _old_ would just lead to another dead end, but with more pointless bickering. “Are you still in charge of the Reapers' Game?” he asked, instead of any of that. It was harder to twist a concrete factual question into a semantic argument.

Joshua didn't respond at all for several seconds, which must have been a sign of something. His facial expression and body language didn't offer any hints as to _what_ it was a sign of, but Neku cautiously counted it as a victory anyway. “...'In charge of' is a—”

“He isn't,” Kozue cut in.

Joshua pouted at her. “Spoilsport.”

Neku took a long look at Kozue. There was still nothing especially remarkable about her. She looked perfectly natural standing behind the counter of this café, which didn't seem like it was significant, but maybe that was a sign of something. Mr. H knew a lot more than he let on, and even if he didn't turn out to be the Composer, he must have been involved in the Game somehow. “So... does that mean you're in charge now?” Neku asked.

Kozue returned Neku's curious look with a withering stare. “Living people shouldn't be sticking their noses into Reapers' business,” she said.

“Neku's my proxy for interfacing with the Game. For all intents and purposes, we're the same. I think you should let him in on the juicy details,” Joshua said.

Neku raised an eyebrow at Joshua. “'Juicy'...?”

“Only the juiciest here in Shibuya,” he confirmed.

Kozue finally stepped out from behind the counter to approach the table where Joshua and Neku were sitting. “No,” she said flatly. “He already knows more than he should.” She shot Joshua a warning look, then smiled at Neku. Neku felt an uncomfortable pressure in his head, something between a headache and the strange feeling that someone was staring at him, which faded after just a moment, leaving him slightly off-balance but otherwise unharmed. Joshua giggled and flipped a page in his magazine.

Kozue pulled a small notepad out of her pocket. “Can I get you anything?” she asked, polite and friendly.

Neku blinked a few times until the strange foreign feeling went away. “Uh... sure. Probably,” he said vaguely. He ordered himself breakfast and coffee, then said, “You know, your café would probably be doing better if you asked people that when they came in.”

“Noted,” Kozue said, then headed to the kitchen, leaving Joshua and Neku alone.

Once Kozue was safely out of the room, Neku sighed and slumped forward on the table. He kicked weakly at Joshua's chair, since Joshua's legs weren't actually under the table. “You suck,” he grumbled.

Joshua giggled and raised an eyebrow at Neku. “That sounds like wishful thinking. Get your mind out of the gutter, Neku.”

Neku glared feebly at Joshua. “If you're going to hit on me, stop pretending to be fifteen. I feel like a creep.”

Joshua feigned shock. “Neku, are you enjoying this?” He grinned toothily. “Ooh, dangerous. Should I be worried about my safety? I'm young and vulnerable, you know...”

Neku groaned miserably. “Will you stop? You're _so gross._ ” Neku dragged himself back upright and leaned heavily into the overstuffed back cushion of his seat. “You owe Rhyme an apology. And me, but I know that's not going to happen.” He heaved a long tired sigh. “You hurt a lot of people. You know that, right?”

Joshua tossed his magazine onto the table and gave Neku a sharp unimpressed look. “Rhyme lost the Game. I don't see why I owe her an apology for breaking my own rules to bring her back to life. She should really be thanking me.”

Neku stared Joshua down steadily. “Yeah, well, if you were already breaking the rules, maybe you should've gone the extra mile and put everything back right.”

“I did,” Joshua said, and that was that. Another dead end.

Neku brushed a bit of hair out of his face and sighed. It felt like he'd done more sighing than normal breathing all morning. “So, what's with Kiribayashi?” If Joshua wasn't going to talk about Hanekoma, asking about the new guy taking his place was probably the closest he was going to get.

Joshua scoffed. “She's a snob.” He rolled his eyes and wrinkled his nose. “She's been here a week and she thinks she's in charge. It's ridiculous. No respect for authority.”

“Good to know we've got more snobs with no respect for authority lined up to be in charge of the afterlife,” Neku said dryly. “What's the point of firing you if they hire your clone?”

Kozue emerged from the kitchen with pancakes and coffee. She laid them on the table in front of Neku and gave Joshua a significant look that Neku was fairly certain he wasn't supposed to notice. Joshua smirked at her. “Problem, officer?” he asked, ruining any semblance of secrecy in an instant.

Kozue glanced at Neku out of the corner of her eye, then flicked her gaze back to Joshua. “You aren't the Composer anymore, Kiryu,” she said, calmly and evenly.

Joshua shrugged loosely. “I don't see what that has to do with anything.” He gave her a measured look. “You should still have respect for your elders, even if you don't work for them.”

Neku peered at Joshua (fifteen), then Kozue (at least thirty). “How old...?”

“Twelve,” Joshua said at the same time Kozue said, “Forty-seven.”

Joshua shook his head grimly. “Kozue, nobody is going to believe you. You need more wrinkles if you want to pull off almost fifty.”

Neku debated pointing out that twelve was a lot less plausible than forty-seven when the implications of that sunk in. He sat up straighter and gave Kozue a baffled look. “Forty-seven? That's like... a normal human age. My _dad_ is forty-seven.”

“All immortals have to start somewhere,” Joshua said.

Neku shot Joshua a suspicious look. “You'd better not turn out to just be some creepy old guy.”

“Wouldn't that be something?” Joshua said at the same time Kozue said, “He's four hundred.”

Joshua huffed. He grabbed his magazine off the table and threw it at Kozue's face, but she caught it before it made impact.

Upon consideration, Neku was not sure that Joshua being several hundred years old was any less creepy than him being sixty would have been. Being simultaneously fifteen and older than fifteen was a recipe for disaster, no matter what the circumstances were.

Kozue retreated to behind the counter again and went back to whatever it was she'd been doing with the shelves. She left Joshua's magazine on the counter behind her. She didn't seem to be paying attention to the conversation anymore, but it was hard to tell for certain and she was very distinctly _there_. Neku did his best to ignore her regardless.

He turned his attention to Joshua. “So, if you're... an ancient immortal god...” He frowned and gestured broadly at Joshua's body. “...what's with that?”

Joshua glanced at Neku's food. “You should eat that before it gets cold. It's disrespectful to let a chef's hard work go to waste.”

Neku took that as a sign that he was out of free answers for the day and didn't press the issue. He drank his eerily familiar coffee and ate his eerily familiar pancakes, then checked the time on his phone. It was still way earlier than Neku would normally get up, but it was getting to be the real morning. He tapped his fork on his empty plate and stared dully at Joshua, who was toying idly with his phone. “So, if I come back here later, are you still gonna be around?” he asked.

Joshua shrugged. “Who's to say?” He snapped his phone shut and dangled it in front of Neku. “You could just call if you want to keep in touch,” he suggested. He rattled off his phone number before Neku had a chance to object or be too suspicious of the offer, then flipped his phone back open and got back to staring at the screen.

Neku put Joshua's number in his phone, then immediately called it to make sure it was real. Joshua's phone rang. He picked it up. “You're supposed to wait a day before calling or you look desperate,” Joshua said, inspecting his fingernails.

Neku frowned at his phone. Hearing the same voice coming from two places at once was weird and he didn't really know what to make of the fact that Joshua had just given him his real phone number. “Just checking,” he muttered. Joshua hummed tonelessly and said nothing.

Kozue interrupted the awkward silence by delivering the check. Neku paid, then stood up and headed for the door. He frowned and fidgeted with his phone in his pocket. “...Right. So. I'll... talk to you later, I guess. Bye,” he said.

Kozue nodded after him. “Come back any time,” she said blandly.

Joshua waved to Neku. “Have fun out there, Neku.”

Neku shifted his weight a bit, unable to quite get himself comfortable. “Yeah. Will do,” he said to both of them. He hesitated for a slightly-too-long awkward moment, then stepped back out into the normal world.

 


	3. haha and then what ;)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm one of those people who types in complete sentences with proper grammar even in casual settings. Even though all of my friends type like normal-ass human beings, it always looks and feels really unnatural when I do it. It's my secret weakness... I'm not a true Millennial at heart...

After his busy morning, Neku packed up the last of his stuff from home, moved it all into his new room, and said goodbye to his parents, then passed out for a nap because he'd been up since 5:30 in the morning. He woke up much longer than a nap later, in the dead of night, and fumbled for his phone to check the time. As he blinked his vision clear and mourned his sleep schedule—right at the beginning of the year, too, ugh—the conversation with Joshua and Kozue finally caught up to him. He rubbed at his eyes and typed out a message to Joshua.

_who even fires u from being god_

The response was immediate, of course. Among the many things that hadn't changed about Joshua was the fact that he was practically glued to his phone.

 _It still hasn't been a day, Neku. You should consider getting a hobby._  
_It's the middle of the night, too... Have you been thinking about me all this time? If this gets racy, I might have to call the police. ;)_

Neku squinted at the screen, already feeling a stress headache coming on. Somehow, the fact that Joshua typed with perfect spelling and grammar was even more annoying than the flirting.

 _ffs_  
_shut up_  
_im just sayong u shld be dead_  
_if yr not the composer it means someone else is_  
_bc they killed u_  
_right?_  
_*saying_  
_w/e i just woke up_

Joshua's second response arrived after a distinct noticeable delay. Neku had no idea if he had struck a nerve or if it was a coincidence. It _seemed_ like maybe Joshua was uncomfortable talking about whatever happened to him after he disappeared. It was odd. Joshua was never uncomfortable about anything.

 _It's interesting that you think of the Composer as “God.” I bet you'd be an easy target for cults. You should watch out or you'll turn into Megumi._  
_But maybe you'd enjoy that? Hee hee..._  
_As for my miraculous survival... funny, isn't it? It's a shame about the timing. Three years would have been more appropriate if you ask me, but I don't make the rules._

It was hard to tell with Joshua, but it didn't seem especially plausible that 'he's gullible and a cultist' was a friendly ribbing thing. If Kitaniji was Joshua's closest friend and confidant as Composer and that's how Joshua treated him, working for Joshua must have been a _real_ nightmare for everyone else. Neku felt a twinge of sympathy for Uzuki and Kariya and the rest of the Reaper grunts. They probably had it rougher than they let on. Not that that made them not weird evil murder ghosts, but still.

The conversation such as it was did not last long, and the rest of it went roughly the same way: Neku kept prying and Joshua kept evading and no one got much of anywhere. Just like old times.

Text conversations like that were the only communication between them for the next few days. The more of them he had to put up with, the closer Neku got to blocking Joshua's phone number and washing his hands of the whole thing. There was no way it was worth putting this much effort into finding out absolutely nothing. It wasn't like Joshua was ever really his friend to begin with. If Joshua killed him and manipulated him and lied to him before, there was no reason to think things were going to be different now. Especially not with the ever-increasing collection of evidence that Joshua hadn't changed at all and had no particular intention to.

Neku didn't block Joshua, even though he couldn't think of any good reasons not to. He had several _bad_ reasons not to block Joshua and those won the day, against his better judgment. He did, however, stop trying to reach out to him. There was no point in constantly trying to force Joshua to give him information if he wasn't going to cooperate, and Joshua was the most infuriating person in the world to have a normal conversation with.

The result was complete radio silence. Joshua didn't say a word.

It stung more than Neku cared to admit. He was under the impression that Joshua cared about him at least on some level. Even if they weren't really friends and Joshua wasn't really a person and 90% of what they connected over back during the Game was a lie, Neku always thought that there was something real there. If he didn't care at all, he would have left Neku and all of his friends dead.

But, Neku reminded himself, caring about someone and wanting to spend time with and talk to them aren't the same thing. He only thought he was special because he was fifteen and everyone thinks they're the center of the universe when they're fifteen. He was special enough to be a sacrifice but not special enough to be anything else. Joshua wasn't going to open up to Neku and see the error of his ways and change for the better because Joshua wasn't Neku and Neku wasn't Joshua and divine blessings only go one way.

He resolved to tell Shiki and Beat and Rhyme about Joshua as soon as Joshua stopped talking and Neku remembered he had some kind of real life. There was only so much lying and secret-keeping he could manage, even if he didn't really want to get into it with them. Besides, no matter how all over the place Neku's feelings were on the subject, Rhyme deserved to know.

To put it lightly, things did not go as planned. Neku suggested the whole group meet up in person again, which they were ecstatic about since he was usually too frazzled and stressed out to make the trip during most of the school year. He wasted no time in broaching the subject when they were all gathered. He knew if he waited, he would get tangled up in self-doubt and anxious what-ifs. He hadn't been this uncomfortable around his friends for years and he quietly filed that away with his hundreds of other grievances against one Joshua Kiryu.

He jogged through the usual throngs of people at Hachiko, going to and from work and stores or meeting up with _their_ friends, toward Shiki, Beat, and Rhyme, waving and smiling as much as he could under the circumstances. He mumbled a hasty greeting, then said, “Joshua's back,” without even waiting for a response.

Beat stared at him like he had two heads. Rhyme smiled politely at him as if waiting for an explanation. He gave Shiki a pleading look; even if the siblings wanted to play a prank on him, as Neku's best friend she'd been subjected to an obscene amount of Joshua venting. She would know better. She smiled awkwardly and shook her head. “Someone you know from school?” she ventured. She snapped her fingers. “Oh, or an artist! You know way more about that stuff than the rest of us!”

Neku blinked owlishly at Shiki, the hair on the back of his neck starting to stand up. He looked rapidly between Shiki and beat and Rhyme, all of their expressions slowly morphing from baffled to concerned. “You... you guys are messing with me, right?” Neku said. All three of them responded with a confused muttered denials and questions and gentle suggestions that Neku go sit somewhere quiet because he was clearly teetering on the edge of some kind of meltdown. Neku brushed them off and backed away a few steps, shaking his head. “No, no, I'm fine. Just a second, I need to...” He pulled his phone out of his pocket and called Joshua. “...make sure I'm not losing my mind,” he muttered.

Joshua picked up within seconds, while Neku's friends huddled up and murmured inaudibly amongst themselves. “Hiya, Neku. To what do I owe the pleasure?” he said.

“Joshua, what the hell did you do?!” Neku hissed through clenched teeth. He would have shouted, but people were already starting to stare at him.

“Hmm? I haven't done anything. What's gotten you all worked up? You should learn to manage your stress before you give yourself an aneurysm,” Joshua said, as detached and above it all as ever.

“No one but me remembers you!” Neku growled. “Like hell you didn't do anything!”

“Who, me? Maybe they just forgot. Not everyone is as sentimental as you, Neku.” 

Neku could imagine with perfect clarity the condescending smirk he was sure was on Joshua's face. He scowled at the empty air in front of him and, incidentally, several random strangers who happened to walk into his line of sight.

“This is why I stopped talking to you,” Neku said, his shoulders tensing. “There's no point.”

“I could come by and see if that jogs their memories,” Joshua offered. “You _did_ invite me...”

“No!” Neku snapped. He balled his free hand into a tight fist, his fingernails digging painfully into his palm. “The offer's expired. I don't want you anywhere near them. Or me.”

Joshua snickered. “Suit yourself. On an unrelated note, did you know Ramen Don has a new lunch special on Wednesdays? If you hurry, you could still make it.”

Neku squeezed his eyes shut and let out a harsh sigh. “...Whatever.” He snapped his phone shut unceremoniously, then rejoined his friends with a muttered apology and vague explanation that Joshua was a distant cousin he thought he had told them about. None of them called him on his obvious lie, though he could tell they didn't believe him.

With his initial plans of causing a huge amount of drama and possibly physically restraining Beat from beating Joshua to a bloody pulp out the window, Neku had to come up with something else for them to do. He checked the time, then sighed, his eyelids drooping as the resignation set in. In theory, he _could_ just ignore it, but in another much more important way, he had to go find out why Joshua wanted him to go to Ramen Don. “You guys want to go get ramen?” he asked. “I hear there's a new lunch special.”

The other three agreed without any fuss, mostly because none of them would ever say no to ramen, and partly because Neku was still acting weird and they didn't want to put him in a worse mood. The trip to Ramen Don, with Shiki and Beat and Rhyme chatting energetically and Neku lagging a little bit behind, mostly listening and only occasionally cutting in with a dry snarky comment, was sort of nostalgic in an embarrassing bittersweet way. Neku had to assure them what felt like every five seconds that he was really fine and he really didn't feel left out and they should go ahead and ignore him. They got the message eventually, though they weren't happy about it.

Ramen Don was as small and dingy and sort of run-down as ever, and practically empty when they got there. Shadow Ramen still had Ramen Don beat on pretty much every level and Neku wasn't entirely sure how this place managed to stay open for all these years. It definitely wasn't the atmosphere, which he was fairly certain was going for cozy but was more akin to a musty cave someone had furnished in the hopes no one would notice the bats. The owner was as exhausted and desperate as ever, which didn't help matters. The ramen was the best in the city in terms of taste, but getting past the presentation was a feat few could accomplish.

The only other customer there was a familiar face; the fact that this was the favorite haunt of at least one Reaper might have had something to do with its seeming immortality. Beat elbowed Neku (and Shiki, for good measure) in the ribs as soon as all of them were inside. “Yo, ain't that a Reaper?” he said to Neku in a stage whisper. He jerked his chin toward the only occupied table, where Koki Kariya, looking the same as ever up to and including wearing the same exact hoodie, was peacefully slurping a fresh bowl of ramen. He looked up at the group and waved lazily to them, then went back to eating.

Neku's first thought upon seeing him was that this leg of Joshua's latest nonsense was surprisingly straightforward. Neku's second thought was that if Kariya still looked the same, maybe not aging was just a dead people thing and Joshua was going to be fifteen forever. He did his best not to think about that one too hard on top of everything else. “Looks like it,” Neku replied. “I'm gonna go say hi.” He took half a step toward the table, but Shiki reached around Beat and grabbed his arm and stopped him in his tracks.

“Neku, are you nuts? What if he attacks you?” she said urgently.

Neku rolled his eyes. “If he attacks me, he's got two knuckle sandwiches with his name on 'em, courtesy of you and Beat.” Beat pounded his fist into his palm and glared at Kariya as a quick confirmation. Rhyme sighed, then gave Kariya a smile and a friendly wave.

Shiki frowned tightly, but released Neku's arm. “I guess he can't really do anything while we're in public, but...” She glanced at Kariya, then back at Neku. “Are you sure you want to get into Game stuff again?”

Neku nodded at her. “I'm sure. Go sit down. I'll be right there.”

He stepped away from Shiki and Beat and Rhyme, who quickly fell in with the owner, and sat down across from Kariya, staring him down with guarded suspicion. The chairs in this place were all lumpy and overstuffed and it made him feel vaguely ridiculous to be having a serious conversation sitting here, but apparently that was how it had to be. “Hey, Lollipop.”

“Hey, Phones,” Kariya returned easily.

Neku frowned and scratched at his neck. “...I'm not even wearing headphones.”

“And I don't have any lollipops,” Kariya said. He slurped his noodles pointedly and stared expectantly at Neku, silently urging him to get on with it.

“Joshua wants me to talk to you, but I have no idea why,” Neku said bluntly.

Kariya raised an eyebrow at Neku. “I didn't know you knew each other. That must be a story.” He chewed thoughtfully on a bit of boiled egg. “Can't say I know why he'd send you my way, either. We haven't talked in a _long_ time.” He twirled his chopsticks between his fingers idly, staring silently off into the distance, obviously deep in thought.

Neku watched his hands and didn't interrupt his train of thought in case he decided not to say anything out of spite. It had been a long time since he'd seen Kariya, but from what he could recall, neither Kariya nor his partner were big on the whole being helpful thing.

“...Ah. I see,” Kariya said eventually, without prompting. He pointed his chopsticks at Neku's face. “Don't think you're gonna want to get involved in this one, Phones. It's way above your pay grade.”

“Already got dragged into it,” Neku said flatly. “Gimme the goods.”

Kariya snorted. “Can't argue with that.” He ate some more of his food with what felt like deliberate slowness just to get on Neku's nerves. Neku gave him an unimpressed look which he didn't appear to notice. Kariya chewed and swallowed, perfectly content, then said, “I'm not gonna run my mouth too much here—still gotta look out for number one—but I hear even the Composer's gotta answer to someone.” He held another mouthful of noodles in his chopsticks but thankfully didn't start eating again before finishing his thought. “If you ask me, it sounds like someone got in trouble with the even-higher-ups.”

Neku crossed his arms and scowled. “Yeah, he'd _better_ have gotten in trouble,” he muttered. Neku gave Kariya another flat look, which he once again pretended not to notice. “You're not gonna tell me anything else, are you?” he said, though he was already certain of the answer.

Kariya exhaled an amused almost-chuckle. “Nope.”

Neku rolled his eyes. Just as expected. “Figures. Thanks for the info. Good luck with your... Reaper stuff. Say hey to Pinky for me if you guys are still hanging out.”

Kariya saluted Neku lazily. “Will do.” He paused for a moment, not quite long enough for Neku to leave, but long enough for it to be palpable. “By the way, you've still got a Player Pin, right? I'd keep an eye on that if I were you. Might keep you from getting too in over your head.”

Neku furrowed his brow and reached gingerly into his pocket for his Player Pin. “...Gotcha.”

He stood up and returned to his friends no less annoyed after getting yet another cryptic conversation under his belt, but a little more confident in his ability to _successfully_ stick his nose in Joshua's business. Shiki, being the greatest friend in the world as usual, had already ordered ramen for him. Neku told them Kariya was both doing fine and surprisingly harmless, which didn't stop them all from giving him suspicious looks when he finished his food and left the restaurant. As soon as Kariya was gone, the group made an unspoken collective decision to quietly drop the subject of the Reapers' Game and anything to do with it and move on to more interesting less stressful things.

They finished up their ramen, then went out for karaoke. Rhyme lorded her singing skills over everyone in an uncharacteristic show of smugness. Shiki and Beat fought mercilessly over the mic so Neku, who was the worst singer of the four of them by far, wouldn't get a turn to torture them. By the time the night was over, Neku's throat was sore and he was fairly certain his eardrums might burst, but he was having too much fun to be bothered.

On the train ride home, Neku pulled his phone out of his pocket and, with far less hesitation than he probably ought to have had, made the same bad decision he always made.

_hey josh r u on the run frm the reaper cops_

As always, Joshua was quick to respond.

 _I wish!_  
_Close, but no cigar. ;)_

Neku stared at that message for practically the entire train ride home, ready to feel very stupid when he inevitably figured out what it meant in the morning once he had gotten some sleep.


End file.
